The present invention relates generally to an information providing system and method and a storage medium which provide information services to an client apparatus on which a content browser and at least one object operate More particularly, the present invention relates to an information providing system and method and a storage medium which provide information services to a client apparatus on which an object such as an IC card operates.
Still more particularly, the present invention relates to an information providing system and method and a storage medium which write information content provided in an information space to an object such as an IC card via an information processing terminal and read the information content from the object. Yet more particularly, the present invention relates to an information providing system and method and a storage medium which associate read/write operations on a browser and an object on an information processing apparatus.
A variety of devices which use identification numbers and passwords for personal identification and authentication processing have been designed and put into practical use. For example, when users use their cash cards and credit cards at financial institutions such as banks, pay-in and pay-out operations are performed by financial terminals such as cash dispensers by prompting users to enter their identification numbers and passwords and confirming the entry of correct identification numbers and passwords as a means of verifying the identity of the users.
In a storage medium such as a magnetic stripe disposed on one piece of cash card, there is a storage area which is available to the bank only. Therefore, since the entry of the above-mentioned identification number or password is merely the access to this single storage area, the security against forgery and theft is hardly adequate.
For this reason, from the viewpoint of forgery prevention for example, contact-type IC cards having electrical contacts and non-contact-type IC cards on which data read/write operations are performed via wireless data have recently come to be widely used as cash cards and credit cards. For example, IC card reader/writer apparatuses installed inside cash dispensers and at the entrance of concert halls and the ticket barrier of railway stations can access the IC cards presented by their users in a non-contact manner.
Identification confirmation or authentication processing between the IC card and the IC card reader/writer is performed by matching the identification number entered by user into the IC card reader with the identification number stored on the IC card. When the identification confirmation or authentication processing is successful, an application for example stored in the IC card becomes available. This application includes the value information about electronic money or electronic tickets for example. (The identification number for use in IC card accessing is referred to as a PIN (Personal Identification Number).
Recently, with the rapid enhancement in microfabrication technologies, IC cards which have a comparatively large storage space have come into a wide use. Since conventional cash cards hold only a single storage area or a single application, a user must own a plurality of cards corresponding to various uses or purposes. On the other hand, the IC cards having a large memory such as above can store a plurality of applications at the same time, so that one IC card can be used for a plurality of uses. For example, two or more applications such as electronic money for electronic account settlement, an electronic ticket for a particular concert may be stored on a single IC card to apply it to various uses.
Moreover, the IC card may be connected to information processing terminals such as mobile phones, PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants), and personal computers via a reader/writer or via an external interface other than non-contact interface or an IC card chip may be incorporated in information processing terminals.
In this case, various application services based on the IC card may be executed on information processing terminals. For example, the user interaction to the IC card may be performed on information processing terminals by use of the user interface such as keyboard and display monitor of each terminal.
For example, if the IC card is connected to an information processing terminal connected to an information retrieval space such as the Internet, the user can search a WWW information space via a Web browser which operates on the information processing terminal and download (or write) retrieved content to the connected IC card or upload (or read) content from the IC card to a location retrieved in the WWW information space.
Meanwhile, a general-purpose Web browser can display, as a page screen, content such as HTML provided on a WWW server. Especially, recently, the server side can create dynamic pages by means of a scheme such as JSP (Java Server Pages). Handling designed HTML documents as JSP files allows the reflection of database values for example. For example, pages may be worked out as JSP files by designer and their servelet is described by developer for use of databases.
The Web browser can search the WWW information space for the locations of desired content. Therefore, the user can find the content necessary for peripheral devices such as IC cards connected to information processing terminals from the WWW information space by use of the Web browser.
However, the Web browser itself cannot directly operate the peripheral devices such as IC cards connected to information processing terminals. This consequently requires to have a device communication program for allowing peripheral devices such as IC cards to communicate with desired servers, in general.
The device communication program is activated by the Web browser for example, however, since the Web browser has no mechanism for operating cooperatively with the device communication program, no cooperative operation or synchronization is performed between them.
As described above, while Web servers can perform a dynamic page creating operation by use of a scheme such as JSP, this page creation cannot be linked with the communication program for devices such as IC cards.